The Nature Library
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Crickets & Grasshoppers

Ages 6 to 7 · Grade 2 · fall study

Fall Study — Crickets and Grasshoppers

Teachers' References: Insects.

PLATES XXXIV. to XXXIX. inclusive.

Poems by Keats, Leigh Hunt, Holmes, and Riley.

How to catch these insects,.

Where to get the net.

How to make an insect cage.

Subjects:

(1) Short-horned grasshopper, life history.

(2) Long-horned grasshopper.

Katydid, life history.

(3) Crickets.

House cricket.

Mole cricket.

Snowy tree cricket.

Field cricket.

Let the children collect the young ones and full grown insects. Have a sod in the bottom of the cage, and sprinkle it occasionally. Also put in fresh clover leaves, bits of raw apple and carrots, and tall grasses, for the insects to perch upon and eat.

The children will learn to recognize and call the different kinds by name. Let them see the grasshoppers' wings spread in flight, showing the fan-like under wing. See plates. Why are the hind wings larger than the other pairs?

Things to Be Found Out by Observation

Why is it hard to see a katydid which is sitting on the underside of a leaf?

Why is the common grasshopper of dusty roadsides invisible when it alights?

How and what do grasshoppers eat?

What is the use of the brown saliva?

How does the roadside grasshopper make the snapping noise when he flies?

Does it happen every time he flies?

What are grasshoppers' and crickets' "horns" for?

See the swelling of the body as the insect breathes.

Locate the large eyes.

The ears of grasshoppers are oval windows on the sides of the first joint of the abdomen.

They show just under the hind wings in Pl XXXVII., Fig. 10.

The ear of a katydid is a swelling in the second joint of one of the small legs.

Does each katydid have a pair of ears?

Look in the same place for the ears of crickets.

What animals eat crickets and grasshoppers?

Find eggs of these insects if possible

Hear the snowy tree cricket chorus in the evening.

See the different insect fiddlers play.

Distinguish the day and night singers.

How did crickets get their name?

What frog sings like a cricket?

What bird sings like a meadow grasshopper?

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